Andie's prom dress was hideous in Pretty In Pink

That the made-over dress defied 1980s-style was the whole point, I think. The style was meant to highlight Andie’s creativity.

But it wouldn’t be attractive today either. So-called cold shoulders are ugly on any woman.

It looked like she wrapped herself in a shower curtain. Andie's outfits were hideous. I would have made fun of her, too.

It was unintentionally hilarious.

The ugliest dress ever.

I remember Pauline Kael's comment on it: "She looks like a ship in full sail."

You would think Annie Potts would have talked some sense into her.

This was the most accurate depiction of home-sewing ever put on film.

Andie’s whole existence was a joke. The idea that both Andrew McCarthy and the insanely hot (in that movie) James Spader were both hot for her was ridiculous. Everything about her was viciously slappable.

ARE WE GOING TO PROM!!!????

No, bitch, your dress sucks.

While we're on the topic, Duckie should have cleaned his shoes for prom.

This film didn’t age well at all...

But she still got her man at the end dressed like that!

I didn't watch Pretty In Pink until like 2005. But i remember seeing her dress and thinking wtf?! She should've just borrowed Iona's suit instead.

Yep, I remember seeing this at the theater when it came out, and when she debuted the dress, I was all like "Whaaaaaaaaa?"

It was like a Butterick Pattern for the Blind.

This film would have worked so much better if RDJ had played Ducky, as Ringwald wanted. It was down to him or Cryer, and for some reason Cryer got it. With RDJ as Ducky, the original ending of Andie ending up with her best friend would have made sense.

I remember being so excited for the unveiling of the dress & then it was just so hideous and unflattering. Great movie though.

RDJ was so cute when he was younger.

I don't know if RDJ could've pulled off certain scenes like Cryer did.

She took a piece of lace from the prettier dress and added to the other.

It was a monstrosity.

That lace was really pretty vintage lace and she threw 90% of it away for a dickey. Just buy a square foot of lace and leave that pretty pink vintage dress alone.

It was meant to look shit. She was supposed to be gawky and out of step with the times.

Pretty In Pink really makes me nostalgic for the 80’s. I’ve never really watched the whole thing, but I’ve seen bits and pieces, saw the prom scene last night, and was appalled at how ugly that homemade dress was.

The bodice of the original dress looked fine, the skirt just needed work, and that was the problem -- the script called for a dress that had to be fully changed, but started with a dress that just needed tweaking and not a complete makeover.

She saw it in the window, and just couldn’t resist!

No, the dress was just ugly. No amount of doctoring it was gonna help. Too bad because Molly was so pretty with her ginger coloring.

Molly was none too fond of the dress either, it turns out.

Molly Ringworm hasn't had great luck with movie fashion.

That’s the thing with John Hughes movies. The outfits were... not representative of what teens were wearing back then. Even the “fashion-forward” ones. Okay, Andie and Duckie were somewhat realistic, being outsiders. But Ferris Bueller and his leopard cardigan vest? Claire from “The Breakfast Club”? I grew up in a very wealthy NYC suburb in the 80s and teenage prom queens didn’t wear suede wrap skirts and peach scrub tops.

Good to know Molly thinks it's ugly, too. It's just such a dumb movie, though...the bizarre prom dress is just the proverbial straw. For instance:

Iona is cool, there's nothing wrong with the way she dresses, nothing wrong with her listening to '60s music, and there's nothing victorious about her becoming a typical '80s soccer mom dating a stockbroker type at the end. Stef is an asshole, but he's hot AF and Andie needed to nail that then move on. Not just for the sex but it also would've shut up that cunt he was dating. Duckie was gay, the idea that he was pining for Andie was laughable. Blaine is a tight-lipped drip. And Andie's "lovable" dad is a lazy drunk.

Basically, every precept of the movie was WRONG. Not a bad soundtrack, though.

Her BREASTS miss deeds!

Stef was ridiculously sexy in this movie. Who even cares that he was an asshole?

RDJ would have been a much better Duckie. Jon Cryer is just a big NO in everything.

Totally agree, R30 he is just NOT fuckable.

I've never known anyone who thought the dress looked good. Wasn't the reveal supposed to be her Cinderalla moment? How could they have failed so miserably?

Isn’t she supposed to be a great seamstress?

That dress is sewed without hems on the sleeves or facing on the cold shoulder armholes. They just turned it under twice and hemmed it. It looks like some drunk did it at 4:00 am to wear at 5:00 am.

R28, I think they were trying to say she made over thrift shop dresses because her dad drank his pay and didn’t provide for her, not just that she was “unique.”

The silhouette of the dress is the main problem for me. It looks like there’s a giant roll of toilet paper hidden under that skirt.

“Some Kind of Wonderful” had basically the same plot but was a better movie with a better ending, in my opinion.

Was Mary Stuart Masterson fuckable, though? Not in my opinion. I was surprised she was even straight.

the Duckie character was obviously gay but of course not written that way. And like in 16 Candles, Molly's scenes with the father character are flat.

No way r38. Love the scenes between Molly and the great Paul Dooley and Molly with the late great Harry Dean Stanton.

The dress looked like how my sister made dresses for her Barbie.

On the show Cobra Kai a girl recreated the dress for a theme party and it looks as horrific in the recreation as the original did. Why didn't Andi's classmate throw pigs blood on her for that travesty?

It's hideous, yet better than 90% of the dresses on Project Runway.

R20 and R28 get it.

Nice pearls, honey. This isn't a dinner party.

Was the dress supposed to be beautiful or intentionally bad? And from MR’s interview, she signed off on it which meant she basically choose the dress right?

Cold shoulder tops are inexplicably popular right now.

R46 Someone in another thread described them as assless chaps for arms.

Yes, it seems all of the terrible fashions from the late 80s/early 90s are attempting a comeback, including the Little House on the Prairie dresses favored by the likes of Elaine Benes. Soon we will see bitches with scrunchies in their hair.

Molly was so beautiful then, and Harry Dean Stanton’s performance was soooo good...

Her character dressed like an art-teaching granny with dementia but she did drive a fabulous mauve Karmann Ghia. I loved the wardrobe for Stef and Blaine's crew: rumpled, expensive linen in pastel colors; they looked rich. The soundtrack was amazing.

Molly was well dressed for Breakfast Club. Her leather boots, belt, and jacket were so luxe. Wonder why the rich kids in John Hughes movies always had more style when he was usually trying to make the opposite point?

I kinda like it. It'ss bonkers and that's the point. At the time, that inverted-triangle-sack-dress silhouette was a thing (thanks, Boy George), so even though there is nothing in the look that translates well to 2019 eyes, the shape of it was fashion forward at the time.

I love it!

R29

[R27], totally. I remember being so in awe of the outfits worn by Ferris (possibly vintage sweater vest and cool leather jacket), Cameron (khakis, hockey jersey, braces) and especially Sloan (shorts, boots, leather cropped jacket). It was unlike anything worn in my lower-middle-class California high school. They seemed so sophisticated. Maybe the costume designers were really smart as it does make the film seem more classic and less dated. Their homes were always gorgeous, too. Ugh, I’m such an Andie.

Why Ringwald did not get her horrible gummy smile fixed is beyond me. SO fucking distracting. Not even an ordeal, a snip here and there and done.

I've never seen the movie but love that one song.

It was reminding me of something ...

[quote]Cut-out shoulders were unheard of in the era of giant shoulder pads,

What part of Andie's being unconventional did you miss?

Andie was fashion forward, duh! It's obvious that she went on to influence 90s fashions!!!

THATS WHAT FASHION FORWARD MEANS!!!

It wasn’t supposed to be amazing she only had scissors and was dirt poor. Still a classic and loved Blaine. Still love Andrew McCarthy. Not as much as Jake from 16 candles but he can still get it.

On their first date, leaving Trax:

Blaine: Do you want to go home and change?

Andie: I already did.

R36 the opening theme song still rocks imo.

R46 don't remind me. I don't fucking get it.

R48 scrunchies are already in. Saw a whole bunch of them, each around $10. What a ripoff.

I can’t date anyone who doesn’t appreciate 80s movies so I’ll probably die alone.

R31 that was why she didn't want him, that was the whole point of the movie!

^^Except Andie and Duckie ended up together in the film's original iteration. It was changed after initial screenings and audience feedback.

Whatever America was wanting John Hughes was giving them. I don't think it was an accident that Hughes didn't copy the fashion trends of the moment.

R57 lmao

RED CARPET opportunity. Glaringly so. At least the MTV Awards..

Dorothy looks great, yet like she's going to the campfire to toast marshmallows with that dress.

It looks like she has two vaginas on her chest.

If she had left off the sleeves and just made it a halter dress it would have been so much better. My friend wore a pink and white backless halter dress to prom in 1984 and looked fantastic.

The original vintage dress she destroyed was so beautiful. I have no idea what teenage girls like, but would someone wear a vintage dress like that to prom today? I would. But then I'm an eldergay dude.

That's because it was John Hughes putting his Boomer sensibilities onto a GenX film, R28. None of us really knew anyone who behaved like that or acted that way in high school, and no one thought the retro chicks needed to go become Yuppies to succeed.

We had a couple of girls wear vintage prom dresses and a friend of mine said you could find vintage styles in the mall prom dress sections, too. So Andie could have worn it without such a severe hairdo and people would have said she looked cute.

At least it didn't have toilet paper rolls.

Why did nobody admit Molly Ringwald was not attractive at all

r30 Duckie was obviously gay, but Hughes didn't have the balls to write and film that. RDJ is also obviously gay, and once the film was "inned" so to speak, he could never have played that role because he oozes camp.

I don't know if Cryer is gay or not, but he's much more "passable" at any rate.

Molly was attractive in her 20s through 40s.

The dress reminds me of something Iola Boylan would wear.

Cryer has been married to a couple trashy Vegas-waitress types and has the brutal divorce settlements to prove it. I don’t think he’s gay, or if he is, he doesn’t understand how to reply a beard.

I was reading an interview he did a few weeks ago. Seems like a nice guy. The complete opposite to Lex Luthor lol

I just watched 16 Candles and I was laughing my ass off at how politically incorrect the movie was. The chinese dude, the protagonist saying "fag", rape thrown around ever so casually, the nude shower scene, the groom's family being portrayed as tacky, etc. John Hughes really had something that no one else had, I do hate the comedy bits he wrote for the parents. I loved the credit sequence scene with its idealized portrayal of high-school life, it feels so fresh in a way that say Heathers doesn't. Pretty in Pink is better though, McCarthy's kind of a dweeb but an adorable one and I think that audience's reaction to the original ending was to be expected, Duckie's so annoying.

Ferris Bueller is the one that aged better, the costumes look less dated and the way it's shot makes it look more aesthetically pleasing. I also liked that the light weight manages to pack some emotional stength.

Here’s Iola Boylen in a similar dress.

R37 MSM as Watts was and still is considered a soft-butch dreamboat retro-idol among lesbians. I wanted to be her, or to get a girl just like her as my HS gf.

Alas the girls at my school were mostly Amandas and Bennys and Claires. I guess I was considered an Allison (Breakfast Club).

Prom dresses have always been notoriously bad. Being a homosexsicle myself, I think boys at prom look sexy, no matter what period of horrible tuxedo.

R83 speak for yourself!

I am 100% correct. The dudes have swag with their "ugly" tuxes

Mother and daughter recyling mom's boring dress. They both have handsome dates.

Molly Ringwald was never a beauty

I know I was embarrassed for her.

[quote] Why did nobody admit Molly Ringwald was not attractive at all

I tried telling you people that, but you wouldn't listen.

R71 I'm with you. I loved the vintage prom dress and would have worn it myself

OP - I just want to let you know, you didn’t break me.

I'm so glad i have the soundtrack on CD.

R93 Pfft. I had it on cassette.

I had it on two tin cans and a piece of string.

wax cylinder

my late friend once worked a rummage sale next to Molly Ringwald at London Terrace and said she was cool

I had the piano rolls.

I think it will be a sensation if someone wore the dress to this year’s Met Gala. Subversive and amusing at the same time. Everyone will get the reference right away.

I predict 50% of the Met guests who bother to attempt camp, will miss.

R97 I believe it. She was sort of a proto-hipster before that was a thing and fairly outgoing.

R88 perhaps by impossible-DL starlet standards. in OP's pic she's quite charming to look at if a little kooky.

"Cold shoulder tops are inexplicably popular right now."

Straight men like them, so not so inexplicable. But I agree that it's a bad trend.

R102 they look Texas cheap

She shouldn't have altered it.

strange film, but i love james spader in it

I had my own "Pretty in Pink" moment. I helped a dirt-poor high school girl that worked at the same restaurant I did in '86. My grandma had a 50's prom dress laying around. I didn't change the dress (like the one pictured) at all.

We styled it with white ankle boots, a big lace bow a'la Madonna and lots of fake pearl mardi gras beads and thrift store rhinestone necklaces. Very "Like A Virgin," although a couple of years off. Some thick eyeliner and red lips.

She got mad props.

That’s sounds really cute for that era, R106. That’s the great thing about those dresses, in a way they are classic. You can do anything with them.

There’s an English dress company called Horrock’s that made dresses in the forties and fifties, really well made. They made fancy dresses and house dresses. They were made well so they held up. Now some women collect them and wear them. They did a lot of working with pattern and matching it on the diagonal.

Here’s something you can do to re-use a dress with a damaged top.

[italic]Planes, Trains, and Automobiles[/italic] is John Hughes' best work.

R109 never saw Curly Sue.

This girl did a good job.

That’s a pretty nice dress at R111. The back is great.

I always thought the original dress was great and she completely ruined it. Much like her acting since Facts of Life.

[quote][R109] never saw Curly Sue. —Jim Belushi

I did. I couldn't finish it. The [italic]Golden Girls[/italic] episode Alisan Porter was in was better than that.

I imagine all of you sneering at the frock in much the same way Steff did when Andie first walked into PROOOOOOOOM.

This movie should be lauded and remembered if only for the fact that it was the first time the female protagonist in a mainstream teen romance movie called the male lead a “filthy FUCKING liar” to his face. Nbd now but it must have been like a verbal slap to the chops hearing it back then.

R116 that scene is pretty amazing.

Blane was weak.

Molly Ringwald's clothes were strange. No one was wearing her "Laura Ashley/Holly Hobbit New Wave" look.

You wore black, preppy or polyester.

Wearing all black was an odd thing to do. I was always asked if I was attending a funeral.

Where’d you get your clothes, five-and-dome store?

Her hair is the absolute worst in this movie. That's saying something given hairstyles in the 80s.

Jamie Lee Curtis in Prom Night had a horrible prom dress. Looked like a potato sack. Ugly. https://youtu.be/Gu2iRgPMiRk

Sorry. Here's the link.

They gave the bitchy slutty blonde the best dress in the movie.

R124 that woman looks just like Miss Cillian Murphy.

Ringwald is a likeable magnetic leading lady in the right role and opposite the right people, but she had negative chemistry with both McCarthy (remember FRESH HORSES? yeah..) & Cryer. I have no idea what the casting directors were thinking.

If he hadn’t already done three pictures together with Molly, Anthony-Michael Hall might have been a better choice for Duckie and have made the ‘Andie ends up with her BFF’ ending make much more sense. The two of them have the intangible ‘click’ necessary for onscreen dramedy to work.

R122 the remake definitely had better fashion. But it could've done with a good disco sequence.

Has Andrew McCarthy had chemistry with anyone on-screen?

R128 incredibly he was halfway believable opposite Helen Hunt in ONLY YOU (1992), which may be because back then he looked and sounded like a soft-butch.

Rob Lowe, r128

I never understood why Andie didn't try to arrange s threesome with Blaine and Stef.

She made it herself.

Those Horrock’s dresses are cute r107.

Molly Ringwald’s whole vintage laundry bag style was ridiculous. How she was the epitome of cool girl in the 80s is baffling. Never understood why she was so popular.

She wasn't popular, r133. She was an outsider with "something" that intrigued McCarthy and Spader's characters.

^unpopular opinion but I actually understood Steff’s attraction to Andie more than whatever was between Blane and her.

Take Steff. Here’s a guy who has likely fucked every girl in his bracket twice, so of course he’s looking to get him some strange from a source yet untapped. He’s been indulged in everything he asks for and even everything he doesn’t, meaning that something or someone denied him is instantly appealing for the challenge of it all.

Steff & Andie also had chemistry; if you care enough to bite back at someone over everything they say and do then orchestrate their downfall then there is a frisson of passion there.

I think Blaine was more interested in stef than Andie.

Do we blame him? Stef was beautiful.

Apparently Andrew McCarthy has directed episodes of James Spader's show Blacklist. Have they ever talked about their personal/professional relationship that has spanned decades?

Too bad Andrew McCarthy hasn't aged as well as James Spader has.

I don't think Andrew has aged badly.

Andrew has aged just fine

Why wasn't Spader in St. ELMO'S FIRE? He was the only '80s teen 'Brat' actor who was anything close to a real cakeater.

I mean, I'm glad he wasn't in it. I'm just wondering what the saving throw was that didn't get him cast or even considered.

Andrew McCarthy is bi if not totally gay. James Spader looks like shit now.

I didn't consider Spader to have been part of the Brat Pack.

What's a cakeater?

Spader was not in [italic]St. Elmo's Fire[/italic]. He was in [italic]Endless Love, Tuff Turf[/italic] if we're talking teen movies.

Because someone revived the Buffy thread, I'm now rewatching the first episode. When Cordelia is testing Buffy on her coolness factor, she says: "James Spader?" Buffy replies: "He needs to call me!"

If Andie's prom dress was two-ply, you could wipe your ass with it.

R146 'cake-eater' strictly-speaking describes a Minnesotan WASP of French/English descent, but can refer to any suburbanite Preppy so could apply to the affected persona of a young James Spader (who is in fact a blue-collar son of a janitor).

James Spader's parents were teachers. From his wiki: During his early education, he attended multiple private schools, including The Pike School, where his mother taught art, and the Brooks School in North Andover, Massachusetts, where his father taught. He later transferred to Phillips Academy before dropping out at the age of seventeen and moving to New York City to pursue his acting career.

Best soundtrack ever

[Quote] Because someone revived the Buffy thread, I'm now rewatching the first episode. When Cordelia is testing Buffy on her coolness factor, she says: "James Spader?" Buffy replies: "He needs to call me!"

I envy you. I love season one.

I wish my HS bully had been as suave and sophisticated with as nice a house and adult tastes as Steff. My bully was just juvenile and a total bitch, and solidly a member of the lower-middle-class.

R153 #FirstWorldProblems

I know r153 mine were a drug addicted skank and some loser who very obviously wasn't getting any from anyone and was always wearing t shirts with naked women on them.

One of R155’s bullies..

Everything was hideous in the 1980s.

I always wondered exactly what Steff meant when he asked Andie “so do you party serious?” Did people say shit like that in the 80s?

He meant coke and anal, R158.

I party serious

R158 I like to think of that one as a 'Spaderism', i.e. it probably wasn't the line or wasn't in the script, doesn't really mean anything specific and sounds a bit too filthy and campy for the piece but he said it anyway and it got a chuck so it was left in the final cut.

I love this thread!!!

I loved the movie White Castle with James Spader and I can’t remember her name. It was a class divide love story.

I love that this thread exists. LMBO. I, too, have always hated this dress for years and years. This is the first time I'm hearing others say so. Ugly ass dress. Should have just worn the original.

R163 It was Susan Sarandon with Spader in White Castle. She played a poor, almost slovenly, waitress who was 20 years older than he, and it totally freaked out his rich friends.

Some scenes showed the class divide so well it was cringeworthy. (Also thought the sex scenes were cringeworthy - I don’t want to see Sarandon in bed.)

But I agree it’s a good film that stays with you for a while.

Right, OP . That’s the point. These were the uncool, K-Mart shopping kids. If I remember this movie at all - the point of the dress was that she had to make it herself.

It’s the nightmare of the prom dress that a girl couldn’t afford to buy, so had to make it herself. And still has the balls to wear. Yeah, it’s a horrible dress.

Excuse me bitches, but didn't she use TWO fairly nice dresses to create one fugly one?

Yeah r167 I could never understand why she didn't just alter one of them to fit her.

Iona's dress was of [italic]far[/italic] higher quality than the polyester thrifted eyesore brought home by her drunken father or the one she created. If she had simply worn Iona's or just altered it a smidge, it would have been perfect.

Andie's a real dumb bitch that's why she never fucked Steff. That would have been some smoldering hate sex.

R170 true, that would have been a rough sweaty hot night that woke up the neighbours even though Steff’s neighbours are like a hundred feet away with acres of manicured lawn inbetween.

Steff watching Andie...

Steff talking to Andie...

Steff’s term of endearment for Andie...

Together in front of her car...

I thought Steff should have shown Blaine who the boss was. I would've paid to see that movie.

Look at how gorgeous he was, leaning on that car.

Didn’t like the hat and glasses on Andie.

Andie’s hair and makeup at the prom was beautiful, but the dress was horrendous. The sleeves should have been slender, and the dress fuller.

James Spader....aaahhh....

I just watched a 40+minute yt video with all the dragon scenes from GoT 1-7. Hopefully someone has done a similar compilation of all the James Spader scenes from this movie

She spent the movie dressing like Princess Diana with cheap accessories.

Yes the dress was hideous, but does anyone else think that John Hughes movies were overrated crap? Maybe they are just considered good because the 80s were so culturally bereft but I never understood the fuss made over them.

I remember the first time I saw the movie, I was SO disappointed when the dress was revealed. It was hideous.

I liked the dress. It was interesting.

I never understood why Duckie didn't clean his precious pointy toed shoes before prom.

I wanted her to get with Duckie. Blaine was incredibly bland.

Blaine was INTENSE. those eyes. That hair. Those linen suits. That money.

I preferred James Spader, he was a shit but incredibly hot.

I saw it in the theater when it came out and I was 18 and even then I knew she looked like shit

Stef's motives were classic rich boy slumming. If Andie had been dumb enough to fuck him, he'd have told everyone in school and she would have gone from the class weirdo to the class slut.

They should have cast RDJ as Duckie as Molly Ringwald desperately wanted (it was between him and Cryer and for some reason they picked Cryer). Then the Andie/Duckie ending would have tested way better, and it would have made way more sense than her going back to dishrag Blaine.

Yecch. If I were showrunner of [italic]the Facts of Life[/italic], you better believe I would have pushed her over for a disabled lesbian.

Andi should've married Blaine for his money, fucked Stef on the side, and been BFFs with Duckie, who realized after she got married that he was gay.

Bitch never would have insulted John Hughes while she was still alive. He was the only one who would give her work except for Disney, and they'll hire almost anyone! And it's no coincidence that her film career tanked after that sitcom that threw her ass to the curb like the dead weight she is went off the air after eight fabulous years without her.

R163 I love White Castle. Susan Sarandon probably looked her best and after Sex, Lies And Videotape confirmed Spader’s reputation for playing sexual freaks even though all did he did was sleep with an older waitress.

He goes on in a Playboy interview about how much he loved Susan and how he fantasised about older women; so they probably fucked during the shoot.

R183 although I was born in the early 80s I didn’t see the John Hughes teen movies until the late 00s and was not impressed at all. Maybe because I had seen My So-Called Life and Dawson’s Creek and read YA books and Judy Bloom before, it meant nothing to me.

And I hated Molly Ringwald - freakishly tall, slack jawed, ginger and a bad actress. Like in PiP, the only teen character that could act was James Spader.

I liked his movies with John Candy... but maybe that’s down to John Candy?

R116 that’s classic Aquarius-Sagittarius dynamics at play.

Most typical Sagittarians are flakey egotistical bitches who can’t follow through and try to play childish mind-games to amuse themselves, and nothing annoys fixed sign idealist Aquarius more. Fire & air are a combustible destructive combo, unfortunately. Notice that throughout the movie Steff (played by another Aquarius/Capricorn type Spader) gets just as irritated with Blane for much the same reasons as Andie - like “shit, or get off the pot.”

It wouldn’t surprise me if Ringwald and/or Spader really felt this way about McCarthy behind the scenes, even if they were friends at the time.

Oh god SPOT ON about the flaky egotistical Sagittarius!

I enjoyed 16 Candles and Breakfast Club but PIP was just really blah to me.

Or as the big oafish jock said about Molly's character Sam in 16 Candles. "Not ugly, just, like....void."

Yeah. Pretty in Pink was kind of depressing.